HEALTHCARE HYGIENE
Under pressure
Chad Grainger, Key Account Manager – Public Services at Kärcher UK, discusses how Kärcher can help to alleviate the pressures on healthcare maintenance teams.
Keeping hospitals clean is a crucial part of patient safety. The importance of the hospital environment in patient care has become increasingly apparent within the last few years. It comes as no surprise that maintaining the hygiene of a healthcare setting helps prevent infections.
The quality of cleaning products and methods available can be varied, and coupled with external pressures such as staffing issues, it can have an indirect impact on patient care and healthcare worker safety.
Cleaning as part of patient safety
There is no doubt that cleaning and disinfecting hospitals to prevent infection works. There is a wealth of information on products and chemicals that help to eliminate certain types of pathogens. Therefore, it’s important that environmental cleaning and decontamination measures are followed religiously to ensure patient safety is not compromised.
However, with media attention highlighting current pressures the industry is facing, particularly staffing in all areas, it’s important to find a way that resolves this pressure without compromising on cleaning results. Kärcher’s PDIR method of cleaning ensures healthcare facilities are cleaned in a robust and preventative manner, which helps to reduce the time needed for intensive deep cleaning. This method allows facilities managers to refocus their efforts on priority areas.
The PDIR method focuses on maintaining high cleaning standards in an efficient manner, which is done by breaking the cleaning down into four parts: Preventative, Daily, Interim and Restorative.
Cleaning in a healthcare setting
Hospital environments are complex and require a varying level of cleaning dependent on the situation and the product required. There are five main variables to cleaning within a healthcare setting, relating to two main tasks of removing soil or disinfecting and cleaning on a microbiological level.
These elements are based on what product or intervention needs to be applied, the technique and equipment used
42 | TOMORROW'S CLEANING
to apply the product, the type of surface, the level of contamination of the environment, and the cleaning staff themselves. If any one of these elements is lacking or missing, the cleaning will be substandard.
Additionally, maintaining a hygienic and safe hospital environment is not only about removing soil or disinfecting areas, it’s also about presenting an environment that is inviting for patients, helping to instil confidence in their care. Patient perception is paramount for any healthcare facility.
The right product for the job
With high footfall settings such as hospitals, surfaces can become damaged due to the movement of people and equipment, all of which need to be deep cleaned daily. By utilising the PDIR method, created by Kärcher’s cleaning professionals, the frequency of deep cleans can be reduced, helping to save time, materials, and ease pressure on staff.
An example of this is the use of Kärcher’s FloorPro Intensive Deep Cleaner RM 752, which is an effective cleaning solution that can be used in conjunction with its scrubber dryers to powerfully remove care films, wax and polymer coatings, dirt and grease. This allows facilities managers to recoat the flooring and return it to a ‘like new’ state, preventing them from having to strip the floors back to their original state and recoat them with a new protective layer.
Investment in hygiene
With the current squeeze on healthcare systems, it makes logical sense that hospitals often look to maintenance costs as a first choice to budget cuts, both in the products and staff.
However, the cost of not cleaning can have an adverse long- term effect on budgets within a hospital. It is imperative the industry looks beyond upfront costs; as with medicine, prevention is always better and less expensive than a cure.
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